Larger Than Life – Slow Men Working!

Hi, this is Mike. Thank you for being a part of what God's doing at the Heights Fellowship.

We hope you enjoy this message. We know it's not the same thing as being here in person,

but we pray that God would move as you listen and as God applies this to your heart.

Woo, good day. Good to be home, for sure. We're going to continue our series on the

disciples, who they were, kind of how Jesus worked in their lives. Hopefully you're finding

some encouragement for that. It's hard to believe it's been a month since we were in

this study. We had the week where we celebrated paying off the building, then we had the last

two weeks. So it's been a month since we've been in this. And we're going to start talking

about the second grouping of the disciples. Remember of the 12, there were kind of three

groups within that. If you want a copy of the notes, you want to follow along with the

notes, that's the QR code to do that. I'm going to read from the listing of the disciples.

If you want a copy of the disciples of the four listings in the New Testament in the

Gospels, then there's one in the book of Acts. And I'm going to read from that today. This

is just after the ascension of Jesus, and it reads this way. That the apostles were

at the Mount of Olives when Jesus ascended, so they walked a half mile back to Jerusalem.

And then they went to the upstairs room of the house where they were staying, what we

call the upper room. Here is the list of those who were present. Peter, John, James, and

Andrew. That's that first grouping. We've talked about them and their group. And then

the second grouping is this, Philip, Thomas, Bartholomew, and Matthew. We're going to launch

out on that today. And then the third group is Simon the son of Zealot, or Simon the son

of Zealot. James the son of Alphaeus, Simon the Zealot, and Judas the son of James. Remember

at this point, Judas Iscariot had killed himself and he was no longer around. So that last

grouping is just those three guys. But before we do that, we're going to talk about Philip

today. I feel like we need to address some of the things that we're going to talk about.

You know what it is, right? When you think about Philip, if you've watched the show The

Chosen, you look at that. The real question that we really want to answer, and this is

the deep spiritual truth I want you to get today, is Marcus really Philip? That's Marcus

Pedroza, one of our pastors on the right. This was when he was in college. This is part

of, if you were in that time and place, we called this the golden fro picture because

the arm to his right is Max Webb, one of our guys who had the most beautiful golden afro

you've ever seen in your life. It was spectacular. Anyway, but Marcus, you look at Yashi Bariga,

the actor who plays Philip in The Chosen, and you look, it's uncanny, isn't it? The

whole time I've been watching it going, Marcus is Philip. Marcus really is Philip. So when

you see Marcus out in the hall today, be sure and congratulate him on a fine acting

job.

Be sure and congratulate him on a fine acting job for this deal. Anyway, so we want to talk

about Philip. And as we talk about him, here's the cool thing about Philip the apostle or

Philip the disciple. He wasn't even the most famous Philip in the Bible. When we think

of Philip, you inevitably think of Philip who led the Ethiopian official to Jesus on

the Gaza Road, or you think of Philip who was one of the seven chosen in Acts chapter 6,

or you may even think of Philip the Tetrarch who was the...

The son of Herod the Great who was one of the... He was a quarter ruler of Judea. That's

Tetrarch means a quarter or a fourth part. He ruled a fourth of Judea. And then there's

this Philip, Philip the disciple or Philip the apostle. And so let me... And this is

in all sincerity. Now, I want to clear up one of the things people say, well, the Philip

who was the apostle was also the same guy as Philip the deacon or Philip the evangelist.

And that's just not true. And that's not true. And that's not true. And that's not true.

And that's not true. And let me show you why. When you get to Acts chapter 6, where

they choose the seven, what we call deacons, this is the first time they chose them in

the Bible, we see a Philip listed. And here's the story. The 12, which are the apostles

of which the Philip we're going to talk about today is a part of, these 12 summoned the

congregation of the disciples and said, it's not desirable for us to neglect the Word of

God to serve tables. Here was what had happened. There was an issue in the church.

Let me show you some pictures of that. You might hear this, but this was at the beginning

of the birth momentos where the pharisees followed the way we established them and it

followed His five characteristics and the oldest

order of the gods that was the command of the Pharaoh and his people. And the Paul wanted

You have the Judean Jews, the people from that area who were raised in and around Judea and Jerusalem who spoke Aramaic predominantly.

And then you have the Hellenistic Jews, which were people who were raised in the Greek culture from the outside.

And they had come to Jerusalem as Jewish pilgrims for Pentecost and met Jesus and got saved.

And there is a divide just because of language and location and geography and race with all of these people.

And the Hellenistic Jews are saying, hey, the Judean Jews are getting fed and we're not.

And so the disciples, the apostles, the 12, say, listen, okay, this is a legitimate problem.

But we don't need to be waiting tables.

We need to find some people within the congregation to do that, to divide the responsibility.

We need to be focused on prayer and on reading and studying the Word of God.

And so they say, find seven among you who are of good repute.

And appoint them for this.

And they found these guys.

Here's the list.

Stephen, you've heard of him, a man full of faith and full of the Holy Spirit.

And Philip.

And then it lists five other guys.

Well, there's Philip right there.

But this Philip is not to be confused with the one of the 12.

Okay, you got that?

That's important to know.

We see the Philip that is chosen here in Acts chapter 6, two chapters later in Acts chapter 8,

where Philip the evangelist and Philip the deacon are essentially the same guy.

All right?

It's not.

It's not two different guys.

It's the same guy who's doing this ministry.

And Philip goes to the region of Samaria.

And it says that he began proclaiming Christ to the Samaritans.

And the multitudes of Samaritans were believing in accord with what was going on.

And they were seeing signs and wonders to accompany all of that.

It's an amazing time.

And it says that the apostles sinned two of their own to verify and validate what had happened.

Now, here's my perspective.

Here's my point.

A lot of people have tried to say, well, no, this was Philip the apostle that went and did this ministry.

If an apostle initiated the ministry, why was apostolic confirmation required for the ministry afterwards?

So it can't be the same guy.

It can't be the same Philip.

So it's a different Philip that we see here.

And so we're going to talk about this guy, Philip the apostle.

Philip who was one of Jesus' chosen 12.

Philip who we see in the gospels as a Christian.

He was a Christian.

His name is really simple.

It means lover of horses.

I mean, who doesn't love horses?

If you don't love horses, you're not American, right?

You're a communist or something.

So he loved horses.

But here's a fact.

He's a good Hebrew boy, but we're never given his Hebrew name.

We don't know what his real name, like Peter's name was Simon.

We don't know what Philip's Hebrew name was.

He's only given the Greek name all throughout the Bible.

We know his hometown was Bethsaida.

We know that from John chapter 1 that we'll get to here in a minute.

And as such, he would have been friends with Peter and Andrew and James and John.

And probably himself was a fisherman too.

Now here's an interesting factoid that we don't know.

Most scholars believe that this Philip probably was a follower of John the baptizer.

We don't know that for certain.

But because in John chapter 1, we see Peter.

And Andrew and John in verse 42, right by Jesus where John the baptist is.

And the next verse, we see Philip.

And because of the proximity, they're so closely grouped together.

We think that they may have been right there together.

In the listing of the disciples, in the four places they're listed,

in Matthew, Mark, Luke, and Acts,

Philip is always listed fifth.

He is the first disciple listed of the second grouping of four,

like we talked about a minute ago.

Which is the first disciple listed of the second grouping of four.

Which probably indicates that he was the more prominent,

the most vocal, the most interactive with Jesus.

And so he just kind of falls in the list in that kind of spot.

But he's always in this place in the list.

Here's what's really interesting.

Matthew's gospel, Mark's gospel, Luke's gospel,

he's just a name on a list.

John is the one who develops him.

John is the one who wrote 60 years after the other guys wrote.

John is the one who really gives,

gives us the personality and the picture of who Philip was.

And so this morning, what I'm going to do is from John's gospel,

I'm going to show you four.

She's not here, but I want to use the word vignette for Ariel.

She loves it when I use that word.

So there are four vignettes about Philip that I want you to see

that really develop his personality.

And you see something in him that maybe you see in yourself

or you see in the people around you that are closest to you.

And you want,

I want you to see how Jesus moves and works in his life.

Because Philip is really a lot like so many of us.

Okay.

He's, he's the real deal, but man, he's so much like us.

And it's very beautiful the way the Lord deals with him and handles him.

Here's the very first thing about Philip.

This Philip had a seeking heart.

He was looking for God.

He was searching for Messiah, but he really kind of had a dull perception.

I've titled this message, slow men working,

because,

Philip just kind of was slow to develop to the idea of what everything was around him.

And so in John chapter one, we begin to see this concept develop.

Look at this.

So the next day, this was after Jesus had met Andrew and John and Peter.

The next day, Jesus decided to go to Galilee.

And he found Philip and said to him, come be my disciple.

And Philip was from Bethsaida, Andrew and Peter's hometown.

So Philip went off.

And he went off to look for Nathanael.

And he told him, we have found the very person Moses and the prophets wrote about.

His name is Jesus.

And he's the son of Joseph from Nazareth.

And Nathanael is a good Texan.

We get to him, we'll develop that.

Nathanael says, Nazareth?

Can, can any good thing come from there?

It's almost like he said, New Mexico?

Really?

The territory?

Can any?

Can anything good come from there?

He's a good Texan.

Philip says, just come and see for yourself.

I love the way Philip handles Nathanael.

Man, sometimes you guys think that when you speak Jesus to somebody and they have a questioning

or a questionable or a negative reaction to it, that you've got to develop some sort

of an apologetic or a great argument to try to convince them.

Man, the best thing you can do for somebody is look at them.

Say, hey, don't take my word for it.

Come and check Jesus out for yourself.

They'll try to give you all kinds of stuff.

Well, Christians did this and Christians do that and people who claim the name of God

and all throughout history and this, let's say, forget them.

Come and check out Jesus.

Just come look at Jesus.

One of the coolest arguments that I learned a long time ago was to ask people, have you

ever read the biographies of Jesus?

And people would go, what?

They're biographies?

Yeah.

They're called Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John.

Have you ever actually read them to see how they portray Jesus, to see who Jesus really

is?

That's the best indicator of who Christ is.

So look at them.

So Philip handles Nathanael so beautifully.

He was an honest seeker and he was doing it the right way.

Did you catch what he said to Nathanael?

We have found the one that Moses and the prophets wrote about.

Do you know what he's saying there?

The Bible.

That was their Bible.

Moses and the prophets was the scripture.

They weren't taking somebody's opinion.

They weren't following some cultic leader.

They weren't following some cult of personality.

They weren't following popular myth.

They were in the scriptures looking to say, okay, who does the Bible say Jesus?

And let me tell you something.

There are a lot of preachers.

There are a lot of seminarians.

There are a lot of theologians in our world who would do very well to go back to the Bible

and just say, okay, what does the scripture say that he is?

Not what have you developed him to be in your fantasy, but who is he really?

And that's what he says to Nathanael, what Moses and the prophets were talking about.

He wasn't taking anybody's word for it.

He was seeking the scriptures.

The third thing is that he was, in doing that, he was getting things that the scholars of

his day just missed.

They just whiffed on it.

Listen to what Jesus said to the...

The PhDs and the Phi Beta Kappas and the theological and philosophical elite of his day.

Jesus confronts them with these words.

He says, you're searching the scriptures too.

He said, but you know what?

Because you think that the scriptures are life, you miss it.

The scriptures always point to me.

And when you see that, then you have to come to me for eternal life.

My point is simple.

This is the principle that Jesus gives them that fill up God and they miss.

I mean, he looked, he kind of looked at them and said, I got a fisherman from Bethsaida

that has no formal training or education.

And he's getting what you guys with all your degrees have missed.

And that's that the scriptures are pointing to me.

They always have and they always will.

See, if we go to the scriptures and we're trying to just get knowledge or we're just

trying to develop an argument.

Or to further a philosophy or a theology, we miss the point.

Because the point is that Jesus is the equilibrium of all the scripture.

He is the point where they all find their balance.

We get askew if we try to just follow the scripture without letting them point to the

one that they point to.

And that's Jesus.

Philip got that.

And here's another cool thing about this.

Philip, did you know we have Matthew and we have John and we have Andrew and we have

all of these guys.

Guess who the first disciple Jesus called was?

It wasn't them.

It was Philip.

Now, I didn't say he was the first converted, but he's the first one that, according to

John, he's the first one that Jesus called before he called John and James and Peter

and Andrew.

He walks up to Philip and he says, hey, follow me.

Now, obviously, Philip would have had.

Some exposure to Jesus prior to that.

Obviously, Bethsaida and Capernaum and Nazareth are not all that far apart, so he probably

knew of Jesus.

But he's the first one that Jesus vocationally called.

That's the seeker part.

That's the cool part.

Here's the slow part.

Here's where his perception is dull.

He missed something.

And we do this same thing.

We're guilty of this as well very often in our vocabulary as well.

He tells Nathanael, we found him.

Now, understand what he's saying in his excitement.

I get that.

Yeah, we say it all the time.

Yeah, so-and-so found Jesus.

He found Christ.

Let me give you a deep theological truth this morning.

I'm going to say it in Texan.

Jesus ain't never been lost.

We're the ones who are lost.

We don't find Jesus.

Jesus finds us.

Philip didn't find Jesus.

John even says, Jesus went and found Philip and said, follow me.

The next day he said, he went and found Philip and he said, come and be my disciple.

So, it points to some truth.

And I understand the excitement and the thrill of saying what Philip was saying to Nathanael.

But let's pause on this for just a second.

Do we understand that God is always the initiating seeker?

God is the one who initiates.

God is the one who is searching for his lost sheep, for his lost children.

It says all the way back in the Old Testament book of 2 Chronicles that the eyes of the Lord move to and fro throughout the earth that they may strongly support those whose heart is completely his.

Let me kind of develop this.

All around the world, every person in every culture, even the aborigine on a remote destination or the native on some Pacific island that's remote has the same witness.

And that is when he looks out on his environment, when he sees his world, he understands that the sun rises and the sun sets.

And in those temperate places where the seasons come and go and there's a cycle to all of that, he looks at and he understands that there's a deep intricacy to all of that.

And he says this could not have just happened.

It didn't happen by mutation or chance on its own.

You don't get something from nothing by means.

Of a natural process that somebody initiated this.

There had to be a mind and a power behind all of it.

I want to know who that is.

Anybody in the world has the ability to look at that.

And here's a principle that when you take that glimmer of light that God gives to you and you begin to chase after it.

You begin to try to find the source of it.

That God will always give more light.

There's never been a testimony of somebody doing that where God didn't give them more light.

And you live to that light and God will eventually bring the truth of the gospel to you.

The fact that Aborigines die without Jesus is not a testimony to God's negative side because there's not one.

It's a testimony to the hardness of human heart that we never connect the dots.

And so we are without excuse as Paul would say in the book of Romans.

Because we all.

Have that outer witness.

And not only that.

There's the inner witness of our conscience that's crying out.

You don't have a morality without a moral being.

You don't develop that by evolution.

There's a source.

There's a headwater to this flood.

And so what is that?

You live to that light.

God gives you more light.

And humans don't live to that light.

We prefer darkness John says.

Philip is seeking.

That light God is looking for those whose heart may be completely his.

Jesus would go to say listen my whole mission was finding.

He says I came to seek and to save that which is lost.

And Luke 15 is an entire chapter given to that picture.

We see the picture of the lost sheep where the shepherd leaves the 99 and he goes to find the one.

Then there's the story of the householder who loses the coin.

And she turns that house upside down trying to find the one coin that she lost.

And she rejoices when she finds it.

But that chapter culminates in the greatest picture of finding in the gospels.

And that's the story of the prodigal son.

And it's not really the story of the prodigal son.

It's the story of his dad.

Who's longing and looking and wanting his son to come home.

And when he comes home.

And when his son comes home.

And he shouldn't embrace him.

And he shouldn't receive him.

And he shouldn't have anything to do with him.

He embraces him.

And he cleanses him.

And he gives him a garment.

And he feeds him.

And they feast in celebration that he's come home.

Because God is the seeker.

Jesus has always been the seeker.

We don't find God.

God finds us.

What an incredible picture here.

And then there's this.

And this is where some of you guys are going to step back.

Because God is.

God is always the chooser.

And some of you guys are going.

Oh there you go.

You're going all Calvinist on me.

Listen I'm not going Calvinist on you.

I'm going Bible on you.

In Ephesians chapter 1.

You can try to explain it away.

Ignore it.

Deny it.

Do anything you want to do.

But it's there.

Paul writes this.

That he chose us in him before the creation of the world.

How is that fair?

How is that right?

I'm not even going to try to get into that.

I don't even know that I can.

All I know is it says this.

And if you're a Christian.

And if you're a believer.

And if you've come to Christ.

And if God is reaching out to you.

It's because he chose to do that.

And he initiates.

What an incredible truth.

That you are not just some being that's languishing in the oblivion.

That God.

The God of creation.

Loved you and reached out to you.

And said come to me in salvation.

I've made provision by my son for you.

It's amazing when you think about that.

That God's the chooser.

And he chose you.

Your responsibility.

Just respond to the light.

Respond to the love.

Jeremiah.

Old Testament says.

And you will seek me and find me when you search for me with your whole heart.

And I will be found.

He ain't playing hide and seek.

We're playing hide and seek.

And he came to get us.

That's where Philip wasn't understanding all of what was happening to him.

Verses 13 and 14 of Jeremiah developed the idea this way.

When you come looking for me, you'll find me.

When you get serious about finding me and want it more than anything else.

I'll make sure you won't be disappointed, God says.

I'll turn things around for you.

I'll bring you back from all the countries into which I drove you.

He's speaking that specifically to Israel.

But metaphorically, it speaks to our lives too.

I will bring you home to the place from which I sent you.

Off to Israel.

Off into exile.

You can count on it.

Bank it, baby.

God is the seeker.

He says at just the right time.

I heard you.

On the day of salvation, I helped you.

Indeed, God is ready to help you right now.

The best news of the morning is this.

This is the reason God brought you here.

You didn't come on your own.

God prompted you.

Whether it was by guilt.

Or whether it was by something more noble than that.

He got you here.

And He wants you to know that today is the day of salvation.

Today is the day that He's ready to help you right now.

Will you be helped?

That's your part.

Will you allow Him?

Will you yield to Him?

Philip had a seeking heart.

But sometimes he had a dull perception.

The second thing about Philip is that he had a deep heart to share.

I love this about Philip.

He's a lot like Andrew in this regard.

He just sometimes didn't know what to do.

Do you ever feel that way?

I want to share Jesus with my world.

I want to share Him with my family or my friends.

I really feel compelled to be about that.

I'm just not sure what to do.

I'm not sure how to handle that.

Philip goes and finds Nathanael.

We've already talked about that.

Nathanael raises an objection about can anything good come out of Nazareth.

Philip says, just come and see.

I think it's really interesting that his first act,

as a believer, is not prayer or praise or worship or Bible study or whatever.

His first act as a believer is what?

I've got to go find Nathanael and tell him this.

Sometimes, and I think really most of the time,

the greatest sharers of the faith

are the people whose awareness of Jesus is the most raw.

Would you agree with that?

You don't know.

You don't know what you don't know.

You just know that Jesus is real and that He saved you.

And somebody needs to know that.

I think we need to pray.

I prayed this, in fact, on the way in this morning,

that God would kind of cut through all the smoothness

and all the culture there

and get down to the raw of,

listen, this is who we are,

and motivate me to be more overt about that.

To get back to the raw part.

We just,

I just want to share Jesus.

Philip's answer was to Nathanael,

just come and see.

It's almost as if he was quoting that psalm in Psalm 34.

It says,

Taste and see that the Lord is good.

Blessed is the man who takes refuge in Him.

One of my mentors, Dave Busby, used to do that.

He had a whole series on taste and see.

He was great at that.

He would do this,

where he would touch his tongue and taste that the Lord is good.

And the idea was simply this,

that once you've tasted Jesus,

people are going to come and go, come and go, come and go, come and go, come and go.

But once they've tasted Jesus,

there's no other taste in the world like Jesus.

There's nothing as pleasing or pleasant as Jesus.

And once you've tasted Him,

you want that again.

You want to go back for that.

And you'll keep coming back until you stay.

And it's like he said to Nathanael,

once you've tasted the Messiah,

once you've tasted Yeshua,

and you understand,

you understand who He is,

you ain't ever going to be fulfilled with something else.

It's always going to be Jesus.

And then there was this other time in Philip's life

that John records where some people who are Greek

come to Philip to meet Jesus.

Why did they go to Philip?

Because he had the Greek name.

He's our homeboy.

He's going to be sympathetic to us because he understands us.

Because he's Philip.

He's not got a Hebrew name.

Isn't it interesting that the Lord gives him that name somehow?

And he has that in the Lord.

Think about that.

Just pause there.

I just thought about this.

If you're a little Hebrew boy growing up in Hebrew boy school,

and you have a Greek name,

you're bound to be the target of a lot of derision, aren't you?

A lot of being made fun of and maybe being pestered or bullied.

Who knows?

Because you don't have a Hebrew name.

Now, he did.

We just don't know what it is.

But just kind of go there with me.

Isn't it amazing how years before it happened,

God used that to draw people to Philip

so he could bring them to Jesus?

You ever think about how something

that could be a potential negative in your life

that you've been carrying for a while,

an event that happened to you,

or something that has gone on in your life

that you think is a negative.

God, I wish that had never happened.

And all of a sudden, years later,

God uses that for you to reach people.

It's an amazing consideration.

So some Greeks came down to Jerusalem to attend Passover

and they paid a visit to Philip

who was from Bethsaida and Galilee, we're told again.

And they said,

Sir, we want to meet Jesus.

Philip, because he's a little bit slow,

doesn't really know what to do next.

That's great.

I don't know what to do next.

So he does the next best thing

rather than taking them to Jesus.

He took them to Andrew

because Andrew took everybody to Jesus.

And Philip and Andrew, who also had a Greek name,

are the ones who take them to Jesus.

What a cool story.

Sometimes we as disciples

don't know what we want to share Christ.

We just don't know what to do.

It's okay.

Let God kind of develop that in you.

Third thing about Philip is he had a big heart,

but he had a really slow faith.

John chapter six,

it's the story of the feeding of the 5,000 men

who had women and children.

It's probably 25, 30,000 people.

It says that Jesus lifting up his eyes,

seeing the great multitude.

It's a great multitude.

Imagine 25,000 people in the parking lot

at the Heights Fellowship on a Sunday.

And it's just about lunchtime.

And then we've been teaching all morning.

Now what are you going to do?

We don't have food trucks.

Restaurants aren't going to be able to handle all of this.

And they were in a fairly remote location.

They were, Luke tells us, near Bethsaida,

Philip's hometown.

So Jesus sees them coming to him.

And he said to Philip,

notice that he singles Philip out.

Hey, Philip,

where are we going to buy food for these to eat?

We got to cater these guys.

And it says that Jesus was saying this to test Philip.

Notice Jesus' mode of operation here.

And Philip answered him,

Lord, 200 denarii worth of bread isn't sufficient for them,

for anyone to even receive a taste.

And we'll talk about what all that means here

in just a minute.

But notice,

notice that Jesus singled out Philip to test him.

Is anybody offended by that?

How dare Jesus test him?

That's not fair.

Jesus is God and Philip is just human.

And so no way Philip can win.

He's putting him in a situation to fail.

But I want you to notice that Philip is already calculating this.

Because when Jesus says,

how are we going to feed these guys?

He's got an answer.

It just pops it.

Right back.

We don't know why perhaps Philip's job was provision.

We know that Judas was in charge of accounting.

And maybe Philip was the disciple that Jesus had delegated the authority to.

Okay, how are we going to provision for the group as we travel?

Maybe that's why he looked at Philip.

We don't know that.

We're just kind of adding that in.

But that's what's going on.

But here's the deal about the test.

God's tests aren't designed to flunk you out of the field.

They never have been.

God's tests are designed instead to draw something out of you

that maybe you didn't even know was there.

Something that he's trying to develop in you.

And he does that to you and I all the time.

Sometimes when you go through a failure.

Sometimes when things don't work out the way you want to.

Sometimes when you're in a difficult relationship.

Sometimes when you have something bad happen to you.

That's not just because you're bad and God's trying to punish you.

He's trying to draw something out.

He's trying to draw a sweetness or something that wasn't there out of you

and make you aware of it so you can follow him better

and serve him better in it.

Here's what's Philip's hang-up.

Now follow me on this because you may go,

uh-uh, I don't see that.

Philip struggled with something that a lot of us struggled with.

Materialism.

And you go, no way.

Uh-uh.

Now Philip wasn't out buying cars and houses.

That's what we associate with as materialism.

But let me give you a definition.

Materialism is an unnatural awareness of our surroundings.

So much so that it blinds us or distracts us from our true source.

When you use that definition, materialism can be a lot of things.

It's not just cars and houses and bank accounts.

It could be physical attributes.

It can be accomplishments.

It can be position.

It can be power.

It can be all.

It can be all kinds of things.

It can be your education and training.

I've got to get another degree.

I've got to go through additional training.

It can be all kinds of stuff.

But the bottom line is we don't just trust God.

We trust stuff.

Right?

That was Philip's hang-up.

And Jesus looks at him and says,

how are we going to feed these people?

Literally Jesus is asking Philip this.

Who are you going to trust with the importance?

Who are you going to trust for that, Philip?

Because you're going to run up against it in your life.

You're going to run into it in your ministry.

When you can't do, what are you going to do?

When you can't provide.

When there's more month than money.

When you can't seem to break through to get to the next level.

Who are you going to trust?

And that's what he's asking Philip.

And Philip has this test in front of him.

And so he says, Lord, 200 denarii isn't even enough money.

Let me, a denarius was a single day's wage.

So basically he says two-thirds of a year labor and income

isn't enough even to provide a taste for these people.

Jesus, I don't know.

And I don't know why he selected 200.

I don't know if that's what they had in the account.

That's my guess.

He probably consulted with Judas and said,

what we got in that account?

Judas says, we got about this much.

He says, Jesus, we don't have enough to do that.

Now here's the interesting thing.

Jesus never tests us in a vacuum.

I'm not talking about a Dyson.

Okay, he doesn't test us in a place that we have nothing to fall back on.

He always tests us in something we have a point of reference.

Philip had already seen Jesus do a miracle like this.

You remember the wedding at Cana?

When they run out of wine at the wedding and it's an embarrassment

and it's this whole deal and they come to Jesus and Jesus' mom comes to him

and says, what are we going to do?

And Jesus tries to talk her out of it and she won't be put aside

and so he performs this miracle.

Philip was there.

He saw Jesus turn water into wine.

So he doesn't get it.

He kind of flunked.

That test, Jesus kind of put him to a place where he realizes,

I need to trust Jesus better in this.

You see, Philip had a vivid sense of the impossible.

You know Christians like that?

Man, I do.

I fear sometimes it may be me.

MacArthur says in his study, his biography of Philip, he said,

you know, Philip had too much arithmetic to be adventurous.

He was so stuck on the facts that he missed the faith altogether.

Here's the problem.

Here's the point.

What you went through or what you're going through

is never pointless or senseless or wasted time.

But it's always designed to draw you into Jesus.

And a lot of times when we're in that, we question and we blame

and we second guess God.

But that thing is designed to draw you into Jesus.

And when it does,

that whole thing is designed to draw you into Jesus.

The whole Romans 8, 28 applies that God does cause all things

to work together for good.

Not all things are good, but God can use them to bring us

to a new place or a stronger place of faith.

Incidentally, Andrew got it.

Andrew's the one who brings the kid with the happy meal.

And Jesus multiplies it and feeds 25, 30,000 people,

so much so that they were satisfied and filled.

An amazing story.

Philip was tested by the Lord to kind of bring him to that place.

The last thing I want you to see about Philip

is that he struggled to put it all together.

The last vignette we see of him is over in John chapter 14,

the night before the crucifixion.

And Jesus has announced that he's leaving

and the disciples are in freak out mode.

They are in full panic.

He says,

Let not your heart be troubled.

You believe in God, believe also in me.

In my Father's house are many mansions.

Many mansions.

If it were not so, I would have told you.

And I go to prepare a place for you.

And if I go and prepare a place for you,

I will come again and receive you unto myself that where I am,

there you may be also.

And where I go, you know, and the way you know.

And Thomas, we'll get to him in a couple of weeks,

says, we're not sure where you're going.

Jesus, we're a little lost here.

So how can we know the way?

And Jesus makes that incredible exclusive statement

that I am.

I am.

The only way, the only truth, and the only life.

No one comes to the Father but by me.

And if you had known me, you would also known the Father.

And from now on, you not only know him,

but you have seen the visible manifestation of him

in the second person of the Trinity in me.

Now here's the point.

Philip is there.

He sees and experiences this dialogue with Thomas.

He had been there from the beginning with Jesus,

the first call of the disciples.

He had seen the miracles and heard the teachings.

He had seen the wonders and seen the things

come out of the mouth of Jesus.

And Philip, who has the opportunity to step forward

and say, listen, Thomas, I've got it.

Let me explain this to you.

Philip joins in and says,

Jesus, show us the Father, and that's enough for us.

And Jesus says, have I been with you?

I think what Scripture doesn't, in my mind,

every time I read this, I see Jesus go,

Philip, have I not been with you this long,

three, three and a half years?

You don't get it, Philip?

He who has seen me has seen the Father.

How can you say, show us the Father?

I am the visible manifestation of God.

Do you not believe that I am in the Father

and the Father is in me?

And the words that I speak, don't you understand,

I don't speak them on my own, not by my own authority,

but the Father who dwells in me does them

and does the works.

Believe in me that I'm in the Father

and the Father's in me, or else believe in me

for the sake of the works themselves.

Look at the stuff that we've done.

That's only God's stuff.

Philip was one of those guys who was slow

to put it together.

And you think about that.

Sometimes you get frustrated with you

because you don't get it.

Philip was with Jesus every day

for three and a half years

and still had some of the questions you have.

So what did happen to Philip?

Well, in the end, we know that he finally got it

all put together.

He finally connected all the dots.

He saw the resurrected Jesus.

He stuck around and saw Jesus ascend

in Acts chapter 1.

He was in the upper room later on,

like we read at the beginning of this message.

He was in Acts chapter 2.

At Pentecost, he was one of those

at Pentecost who experienced all of that.

And then this, in Acts chapter 5,

he was one of those who was arrested

and imprisoned and reprimanded

and threatened and beaten for Christ.

So much so that he got it.

Listen to what it says in Acts chapter 5, verse 40.

The Sanhedrin, the Jewish Supreme Court,

called the apostles in and they flogged them

and ordered them not to speak anymore

in the name of Jesus.

And then they released them.

And what was their response?

What was Philip's response?

It says,

They went their way from the presence of the council,

rejoicing that they had been considered worthy

to suffer shame for his name.

He got it in a big way.

Scripture doesn't tell us how it ended for Philip,

but it does tell us that he was faithful in ministry.

The best church tradition we have

places him in present-day Turkey

in the region of what's called Phrygia,

I spent like two hours on maps on this the other day.

It's near where most of the churches

of Revelation 1 and 2,

those letters were written to.

It was just, we were just in Ephesus a week or so ago

and it was just east of where we were.

When I realized that, I was shocked it was all that close.

It was right there.

It ended for Philip.

Supposedly he was martyred in the town of Herapolis

in Phrygia,

either by stoning,

or by crucifixion.

Some accounts have that he was stoned and then crucified.

The most gruesome account

has that he was suspended upside down by his feet

and then pierced through the ankles and the thighs

with sharp sticks or stakes

so that he slowly bled to death over the course of days.

It was a particularly treacherous version of death,

but he died faithful to the Christ that he served.

And so as we come to the end of his biography,

this morning,

let me give you some lessons

and kind of see where you land in some of this.

God can take a heart with a lot of problems,

with a lot of issues,

and reshape it in his image just like he did Philip's.

What about yours?

Is that descriptive of your heart?

Second thing is,

God encounters happen most and best

when we were in the right place,

and the right place is in proximity to Jesus.

Are you searching the scriptures,

for the Christ, even now?

Are you searching, trying to learn and see

and get more stuff about Jesus

that you can serve him better

and be more devoted to him?

Third thing,

God's truth flows most easily and best

when we stay in the wonder of Jesus.

When you don't let this church thing

just become dull and dry and boring to you.

If church is dull and dry and boring to you,

if the scripture is dry and dull and boring to you,

that's not a problem with church or the scripture.

That's a heart problem for you.

We're not in the entertainment business,

but the gospel and the message of Christ

is fascinating and wondrous.

Don't let familiarity breed contempt.

Are you aware of the things the Lord is doing

in your world on a daily basis?

Are you looking around and seeing it?

A lot of the things we attribute

as things that we don't know,

coincidence,

need to be attributed to the sovereignty of God.

Only God can do that.

Only God can make those kind of connections.

Are you in wonder and amazement and awe?

Number four,

don't let the stuff of this life cloud your vision

of what real life in Jesus is.

Let me ask you some things.

You look forward to your next week,

to your work or to school

or wherever it is you're going to be.

Is there a thing,

is there an event,

is there a schedule,

something that's going to be a distraction to Christ?

Something that's going to distract your attention from Jesus?

And pray that God wouldn't let that happen.

Pray that you would have the discipline in the spirit

not to let that happen.

And the fifth thing is this,

that God brings us through a lot of experiences

so we can get it.

And by get it, I mean get him.

A lot of the stuff that happens in our life

is so that you can get Jesus

in a way you never could before.

So what is Jesus revealing?

He's revealing to you about himself

through your current struggles

or even your current victories today.

Talk back to us and let us know

that QR code on the screen is for you to do that.

Let me pray over you as we do that.

And one thing before I pray

because I'm going to dismiss you when we're done.

If you want to be a part of a connection group,

you want to take next steps with Jesus

or next steps with the church,

we've talked,

Jim talked a little bit about that last week.

We really want,

we need to hear from you

because we're going to do a class,

the next two Sunday nights,

the 8th and the 15th.

So if you want to be a part of that,

we really need to hear from you.

Go ahead and take a chance

and see what God might have in store for you.

You can just on that QR code,

you can tell us that there as well

and we'll make all the right connections for you.

Anyway, let's pray over you this morning, all right?

Father, we thank you that we've got to come here today

and do a little bit about what they're doing in heaven

to sing and praise and worship that way.

We thank you for the band and what they brought to us.

And then Father, as we've opened,

your word and look to the life

of this faithful servant, Philip.

But we realize that he is one of those guys

that definitely was not a stained glass saint.

The father, he had struggles and weaknesses

and insecurities and he missed the point

and missed the message a lot of times.

He was definitely a slow man working,

but Father, you were working in his life

in a magnificent way.

And I thank you that you reshaped his heart

into your image.

And Father, we know that you can do that with ours as well.

And so we pray for the believers in the room

that you would be doing that with us.

Father, I pray if there would be one in the room

who's never trusted Jesus,

that's never yielded his life to Jesus,

that's never given her heart to Jesus,

that this would be the morning that she does that.

That right where she sits, she can say,

Jesus, I need forgiveness.

I need salvation.

And I believe that you're the source.

I believe that you died on the cross for my sin

and that you rose from the grave.

And that if I trust that and that alone,

you will redeem me and make me new.

And so Lord, I need that and I want that

and I ask you to do that right now.

And Lord, I pray that having done

that you would then lead them to tell somebody.

Father, whether they click the QR code and tell us

or they tell somebody near them,

but Father, they need to do that this morning.

So Lord, I pray you would do that.

Thank you for this day.

Thank you for our opportunity to have community together.

Lord, if you would draw some into connection,

I pray that you would do that for the next couple of weeks.

Lord, it'll be a great time.

In Jesus' name, amen.

Well, thank you for being a part of what God's doing

here at the Heights Fellowship.

If the Lord led you to make a decision

or you have a question or a need,

we want to hear from you.

Send us an email at the email listed below

info at theheightsfellowship.org

and we will join you in praying

as you take a step forward on your journey with God.